White Bear Lake, Minnesota

Area Profile

23,908 residents. Public schools, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for White Bear Lake, in Ramsey County.

59out of 100
Area Score
Bottom 44% of 2,944 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Opportunity3303rd of 3,904 published cities39
SchoolsTop 32% of 2,668 published cities66
Growth2837th of 2,973 published cities15
Housing affordability2317th of 4,223 published cities78
Climate4007th of 4,223 published cities55
Physical resilienceTop 11% of 4,182 published cities90
AccessTop 47% of 4,226 published cities93
Economic stabilityTop 30% of 4,226 published cities70
The quick read

Employment conditions sit below most comparable published city profiles: unemployment is 5.1% and the Opportunity signal places White Bear Lake in the bottom 15%.

Residential permitting has slowed: 6 units authorized over the past twelve months, 50% below the prior year.

Natural-hazard exposure is lower than in most comparable published city profiles, placing White Bear Lake in the top 11% for physical resilience.

At a glance

Population
23,908
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$83,554
Top 30% nationally
Density
2,972/sq mi
8.0 sq mi of land
Median age
41.9
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Ramsey County
Minnesota
Metro area
Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington, MN-WI
Nearest major airport
MSP
16 mi · Minneapolis-St Paul Intl/Wold-Chamberlain
Median home value
$331,800
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 5.1% is lower than 22% of the 3,904 measured US cities.

Employment fell 2.0% over the past year, to 11,403 employed residents.

42% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 83% of measured US cities.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$7,140$83,554Top 30%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$2,336$46,608Top 21%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate7.0%Bottom 33%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute23.3 minBottom 32%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher41.7%Top 17%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment11,403Bottom 5%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)-2.7%Bottom 13%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-2.0%Bottom 18%June 2026
Labor force12,011Bottom 5%June 2026
Labor force participation66.1%Top 30%2024 ACS 5-Year
Mean annual wage$74,580Top 30%2025 OEWS
Median annual wage$59,320Top 23%2025 OEWS
Unemployment change (year over year)0.4%Top 37%June 2026
Unemployment rate5.1%Top 22%June 2026
Unemployment rate
2021/062022/032022/122023/092024/062025/032025/102026/065.12.2
Monthly unemployment rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, most recent value 5.1% in June 2026. A break in the line is a month the Bureau of Labor Statistics did not publish for this area — it is left empty rather than estimated.
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202484k76k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $83,554 in the 2024 ACS 5-Year. Consecutive releases share four years of sample, so AreaProfile shows them as a record of successive estimates and does not compute a year-over-year change from them.
Largest occupations — Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington, MN-WI
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
Home Health and Personal Care Aides93,560$38,860
Retail Salespersons51,180$36,670
General and Operations Managers44,890$103,570
Registered Nurses43,600$103,040
Customer Service Representatives38,630$49,480
Fast Food and Counter Workers37,920$33,040

Occupational employment and wages are published for metropolitan areas rather than for individual cities or ZIP areas, so these describe the wider labor market this location sits in. 2025 OEWS, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

51% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 57% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 13.8 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
26
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
13.8
across all schools here
Math proficiency
51.3%
Top 39% in Minnesota
Reading proficiency
56.8%
Top 32% in Minnesota
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Central MiddleWhite Bear Lake School District92220.049%50%
Matoska InternationalWhite Bear Lake School District54316.045%55%
Otter Lake ElementaryWhite Bear Lake School District49213.361%67%
Lincoln ElementaryWhite Bear Lake School District46919.573%76%
Lakeaires ElementaryWhite Bear Lake School District39614.755%63%
Willow Lane ElementaryWhite Bear Lake School District27910.328%46%
Birch Lake ElementaryWhite Bear Lake School District23910.931%31%
Gentry Academy Middle · charterGentry Academy Charter School19519.5
Normandy Park Education CenterWhite Bear Lake School District1547.0
Level Up Academy · charterLevel Up Academy14514.5
White Bear Area Learning CenterWhite Bear Lake School District14010.8
Gentry Academy High · charterGentry Academy Charter School13419.1

31.1% of students here are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. That describes the circumstances families arrive with rather than how the schools perform, which is why AreaProfile shows it and does not score it.

Public schools only, from the NCES Common Core of Data. Schools are placed by ZIP code, so this is which schools are in this place rather than which one a particular address is zoned for — district boundaries do not follow municipal ones, and enrollment zones change. Fully virtual schools are excluded: they enroll students from across the state while reporting one administrative address, and counting them here would describe a school population this place does not have. The assessment covers grades 3 through 8, so a high school shows no proficiency figure — a dash in those columns means the test was not given at that school, not that it performed badly. Proficiency is measured against Minnesota’s own standard, so it compares cleanly within the state and only broadly against other states; AreaProfile therefore ranks it within state. The directory is current, while the proficiency figures are from the last school year with national coverage before the pandemic interrupted testing.

Housing & affordability

How it’s calculated →

Median rent of $1,601 takes 23% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 4.0 times median household income here, above the historic benchmark of about three times income.

Rent as a share of income
23.0%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
4.0×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,601
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$331,800
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income3.97Top 28%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate67.8%Bottom 34%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±29711,060Top 5%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$84$1,601Top 18%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$6,127$331,800Top 25%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income23.0%Top 25%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate4.5%Bottom 26%2024 ACS 5-Year

Both affordability measures come from the same ACS release as the income they are compared with, so the comparison is like for like. They describe housing cost against local earnings and are not a cost-of-living index — transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes are not included, and a place can look affordable here and still be expensive to live in for reasons this does not capture.

Growth & development

How it’s calculated →
Development Momentum
15/ 100
Ranks 2837 of 2,973 published city profiles
Permitting is decreasing, measured from 2020 to 2025.

An AreaProfile calculation combining permit volume per resident, its direction over one and three years, population change and employment growth. Permit volume alone is not the measure.

Population has fallen 5% since 2020, reaching 23,479 in 2024.

Permitting has turned downward after moving the other way the year before.

New construction is predominantly single-family: only 0% of permitted units are in buildings of five or more homes.

At 0.3 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US cities.

Units permitted
6
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
0.3
Bottom 15% nationally
Year over year
−50%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
0.0%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
2020202120222023202425k23k
Census Population Estimates Program, July 1 of each year. These annual estimates are designed for year-over-year comparison, unlike the ACS five-year figure shown as this profile's population.
Housing units permitted per year
202020212022202320242025154.0
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was higher than 2020 (+50%).

Weather & climate

5 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 83°F and January a low of 9°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 29.2 inches.

Air quality measures a median index of 36, in the Good band, and one day a year passes 100, the threshold at which the air is unhealthy for sensitive groups.

0°20°40°60°80°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station ST PAUL DOWNTOWN AP, 9.4 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.6"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index58.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation29.2"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low9°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high83°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months51991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 10012024 calendar year
Median air quality index36.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing57°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
36
Good on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
58
90th percentile index
Days above 100
1
unhealthy for sensitive groups

A comfortable median and a bad tail are different problems. Wildfire smoke and summer ozone show up in the worst tenth of days, not in the middle of the year.

Climate figures are thirty-year normals, not current conditions. They describe what a typical year looks like rather than what the weather is doing today. Air quality is measured rather than modelled, by EPA monitors, and published by county only where a monitor sits — roughly half the counties AreaProfile publishes have one, and the rest show nothing rather than an estimate. Air masses are regional, so a county reading describes the air over a place reasonably well, but it is still the county reading.

Physical risk

90 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are tornado, hail and strong wind.

HailElevated
TornadoModerate
Strong windModerate

Low or minimal exposure: cold wave, heat wave, inland flooding, landslide, winter weather, lightning, ice storm, wildfire, earthquake, drought.

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA publishes at county level. City values are the population-weighted mean of the counties the city overlaps, using AreaProfile place-to-county land-area weights. FEMA does not endorse this presentation. Higher physical resilience means lower exposure.

These are deaths, not offences. AreaProfile does not publish reported crime, and this is not a substitute for it — it says nothing about burglary, theft or assault.

Ramsey County records 5.2 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, near the middle of counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Firearm deaths of all intents run at 9.9 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 30.2 per 100,000 residents in Ramsey County.

Homicide
5.2
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
9.9
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
30.2
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
14.4
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths

Firearm deaths count every intent together, and nationally the majority are suicides rather than homicides. The two columns overlap and should not be added.

Age-adjusted rates from provisional death certificate records, published by the CDC for Ramsey County as a whole — these rates are not published below county level. A county can hold both a dense city centre and a suburb whose experience of it is nothing alike, so this describes the county around White Bear Lake rather than White Bear Lake itself. That is why AreaProfile shows these figures and does not put them in the Area Score. Where fewer than ten deaths were recorded the count is suppressed at source, and a rate built on single figures moves sharply between releases. What this measure has that reported crime does not: a death certificate is filed whether or not the local police agency submitted a return that year, so the figures stay comparable between places and over time.

What this profile does not cover

Three things people look for are missing from every AreaProfile page, and each is missing for a reason rather than by oversight. The Area Score is calculated without them and the weighting is documented on the methodology page.

Reported crime
The FBI’s Crime Data Explorer is the only source for reported offences with national coverage and a published method, and it requires an API key AreaProfile does not hold. Arrest counts, news volume and commercial “safety scores” are not substituted in the meantime. What is published above under Safety is a different measurement — deaths rather than offences, from death certificates rather than police returns — and it covers no property crime at all.
Taxes
No tax dataset has met the source admission test for coverage, transparent methodology and update cadence. Nothing here is individualized tax advice.
Full cost of living
No public source publishes one with national coverage and a documented method. Housing affordability above is computed from published rent, price and income, and excludes transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes — commuting cost in particular tends to offset suburban housing savings.

Access

3 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 16 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Minneapolis-St Paul Intl/Wold-ChamberlainMSP16 mi11,006 ft
Chippewa Valley RgnlEAU76 mi8,101 ft
Rochester IntlRST84 mi9,034 ft

Airport identity, position and runway data come from the FAA. “Major airport” is an AreaProfile classification — a public-use civil airport with a paved runway of at least 8,000 feet — not an FAA hub designation. Distances are straight-line, not driving distance.

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Area Score
59
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Other cities in Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington, MN-WI

Same metropolitan area, measured the same way
CityCountyPopulationArea ScoreCompare
MinneapolisHennepin County427,24659vs White Bear Lake
St. PaulRamsey County307,28458vs White Bear Lake
BloomingtonHennepin County88,66558vs White Bear Lake
Brooklyn ParkHennepin County83,87658vs White Bear Lake
PlymouthHennepin County79,22073vs White Bear Lake
WoodburyWashington County78,30570vs White Bear Lake
LakevilleDakota County74,35475vs White Bear Lake
BlaineAnoka County72,48860vs White Bear Lake
Maple GroveHennepin County71,17369vs White Bear Lake
EaganDakota County68,00068vs White Bear Lake
BurnsvilleDakota County64,46359vs White Bear Lake
Coon RapidsAnoka County63,46855vs White Bear Lake

Every city here is measured on the same scale from the same source releases, so the comparison is like for like. A higher Area Score reflects AreaProfile’s standardized weighting rather than a judgment about which is the better place to live.

Data & methodology

Used forSourceSource periodUpdated
AccessFederal Aviation Administration
Airports (NASR) — Aeronautical Data Delivery Service
NASR current cycle28-day NASR cycle
Physical riskFederal Emergency Management Agency
National Risk Index
National Risk Index December 2025 (v1.20.0)Periodic dataset versions (v1.20.0 current)
ClimateNOAA National Centers for Environmental Information
U.S. Climate Normals 1991–2020 (Monthly)
1991-2020 NormalsEvery ten years (next release follows the 2001–2030 period)
JobsU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Local Area Unemployment Statistics
June 2026Monthly
JobsU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics
2025 OEWSAnnual (spring release)
DemographicsU.S. Census Bureau
Population Estimates Program
July 1, 2024 estimateAnnual (vintage released each spring)
DevelopmentU.S. Census Bureau
Building Permits Survey
12 months ending July 2026Monthly, roughly three weeks after the reference month
Demographics, Housing, Income, JobsU.S. Census Bureau
American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates (Table-Based Summary File)
2024 ACS 5-YearAnnual (5-year estimates released each December)
safetyU.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics
Provisional county-level mortality by intent
April, 2025 to March, 2026Quarterly, with a rolling twelve-month window alongside complete calendar years
schoolsU.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics
Common Core of Data and EDFacts assessments
2019-20 school year; 2024-25 school yearDirectory annually; assessment results as EDFacts releases them
ClimateU.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Air Quality System
Daily Air Quality Index by county
2024 calendar yearAnnually, once a calendar year is complete

Profile recalculated August 30, 2026. Recalculation is not the same as new source data — each figure above shows the period its source actually covers. Read the full methodology or browse every source.

ZIP codes in White Bear Lake

1 published ZIP profiles
ZIPPopulationMedian household incomeArea Score
5511037,305$101,29662